Jim DeMint, a Senator from South Carolina, is not well-known nationally. This book is his shot at becoming better-known. Perhaps his goal is to run for president in 2012, but more likely his goal is to become a national leader of Christian conservatism. His unabashed defense of hard-core conservatism, and his unabashed application of Christianity as the core of his governing philosophy, make him a weak presidential candidate, but also make him a potentially strong conservative leader.

Sen. DeMint is a political ideologue, not a political philosopher. The difference is that an ideologue toes the party line because it's the party line, while a political philosophy has a coherent philosophy behind the set of beliefs. DeMint's core philosophy is that Christianity is good for society, but he carefully delineates how Christian society differs from Christian government. If DeMint applied that core philosophy to government, we wouldn't call him an ideologue. But instead he separates out his public policy from his belief in Christian society, and ends up just espousing a strict Reaganite voting record.

In fact, DeMint is such a strict Reaganite that he considers himself more of a Reaganite than Ronald Reagan. He criticizes Reagan for negotiating a deal with the Democrats that allowed Reagan billions for defense spending in exchange for allowing the Democrats billions in social spending (pp. 37-8).

Similarly, DeMint considers himself much more Republican than the other Republican members of Congress. He criticizes Republicans in Congress for the 2008-2009 bailout (pp. 122-3); for considering it their Congressional duty to help the poor (pp. 87-8); and for over-spending in general (p. 96). Some of DeMint's greatest venom is reserved for former Pres. Bush: DeMint describes Bush's call for "compassionate conservatism" as just another excuse for big spending (pp.48-50).

So the "party line" that DeMint toes is not the standard Republican party line, but the hard-core Reaganite party line, with a much more Christian core than Reagan ever espoused himself. For example, DeMint writes, "by 2008 it was hard to tell the Republicans from the Democrats" (p. 27). Indeed, to the OnTheIssues reader, except for the year references, DeMint's philosophy sounded more like 1989 than 2009, and the entire book seemed to have been written right after Reagan's retirement, with an "I-told-you-so" attitude for everything that came afterwards.

We mention "political philosophy" because this book is ostensibly about political philosophy. DeMint writes in the opening chapter, "It is my hope that this book will help see how creeping socialism is stealing our freedom, our prosperity, and our way of life" (p. 11), which pretty much sums up the core values upon which Reagan ran for president in 1980. DeMint cites numerous political thinkers, from Milton Friedman back to Friedrich Hayek and forward to Ronald Reagan, and claims that "this book is your plan and playbook for joining the fight to save freedom." In other words, DeMint would like to claim leadership in implementing the Friedman-Hayek-Reagan political philosophy.

DeMint further seems unaware that Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek are libertarians, not conservatives. Yes, DeMint parrots those philosopher's anti-socialism viewpoint, claiming it as the motivation for the book: "Freedom is on the decline in America... Socialism has crept into almost every aspect of American life" (p. 57). But Friedman and Hayek applied that philosophy to the military while DeMint does not; Friedman and Hayek denounced American interventionism abroad, while DeMint considers it our duty to promote democracy abroad (pp. 59-60).

A key difference between libertarian philosophers and conservatives ideologues is that libertarians are consistent in opposing military spending as just another form of government spending. Ron Paul, whom DeMint cites on p. 87-88 as a fellow anti-spender, has an anti-spending voting record on defense spending directly opposite from DeMint's pro-military spending record. Ron Paul's stances are also directly opposite from DeMint's on the Iraq War, the Patriot Act, conscription, and how to deal with Iran's nukes. Ron Paul closely adheres to Friedman's and Hayek's libertarianism. DeMint does not.

Overall, DeMint caters to the right-wing talk-radio audience much more than to libertarians. That's fine if DeMint's goal is to host a right-wing talk-radio show -- we love them for stirring citizens to action! But DeMint claims that his goal is to change America by leading an anti-Socialist movement; Ron Paul has a much stronger claim to that role. And DeMint also seeks a leadership role as a Christian conservative -- but in that realm, Sarah Palin says the same things as DeMint, but with charm and humor where DeMint prefers venom and vitriol.

Social SecurityGeorge W. Bush: OpEd: Tried to institute personal accounts; but AARP won.
Jim DeMint: People should own their Social Security accounts.
Jim DeMint: Right to own a personal Social Security account.
Jim DeMint: Social Security program is built on debt and dependency.
Paul Ryan: Road Map: invest 5.1% income into personal account.